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Here are my festivids recs, from a very scattershot trail through the list. I suspect - and in some cases, know - who made many of these vids, but I refrain from comment on that front.

Gonna Get Through This World (An Adventure in Space and Time)
A vid in praise of Verity Lambert and Waris Hussein. Crisp and heartfelt and with such a sense of glorious promise (I love the brief appearance of Matt Smith).

Galaxyrise (Apollo 13 and others)
A lovely vid, that is not quite fannish in sensibility - it's a vid about the idea of exploration, of what's to come. I wish I'd made it.

Firework (The Gymnast)
For a source I haven't seen and now desperately want to: it's a love story that builds and builds. I love it.

Sailboats (Master and Commander)
Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin love each other a lot, though not quite as much as they love the beautiful world around them, and the sea. This one is so meditative, so beautiful.

Rescue (Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries)
THIS IS IT THIS IS THE SHOW. Phryne, and Dot, and then also Jane and Aunt Prudence, and how they don't need rescuing! Hearts in my eyes.

Say Her Name (Black Lives Matter)
A vid in praise - and in witness - of black protest, and black lives. Like the vid up above (and like more than one of the Hamilton ones, which I haven't got through yet), it's not a vid with a fannish sensibility: it's a vid that positions itself as a transformative work of art at the nexus of many complexities, many of which are so painful that perhaps art is the only thing. I don't really have the vocabulary for this one, but the vid itself does.

This Sullen Welsh Heart (Pride)
This one just - just - edges out in front to be my favourite of what I've seen. It makes really good use of all the beautiful imagery of the film, and the song choice is perfect, and put all together it's a vid about hopeless causes, and why they matter.

I had a very quiet Christmas with friends, and with Shim, and now Boxing Day is as grey and windswept as it ought to be, narratively, and I am quite contented. This is just an initial batch of Yuletide recs, probably there will be more coming, and in no particular order:

The Banishing of Winter (1156 words) by Anonymous
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell - Susanna Clarke
My gift! A lovely fairy tale of how the Raven King banished winter for four years from the north of England. Charmingly, it's set in Sefton - which is not the place I grew up; I grew up in the Metropolitan Borough of Sefton so named because it's not a real place! But it's named for a village that may have existed on the Sefton coast, once, a long time ago, and here it is.

Soft Offering (1034 words) by Anonymous
Imperial Radch Series - Ann Leckie
Breq is given a gift by Mercy of Kalr, and it's the sort of gift only a ship can give. Just lovely.

What's Caught is Gone (4382 words) by Anonymous
Imperial Radch Series - Ann Leckie
A few small scenes of breathing space between the end of Ancillary Sword and whatever comes next. I love this! It's just what it says on the tin, slice-of-life aboard ship, complete with all my favourite running gags from the novel - Kalr Five, and the rose dishes! Bo's rousing choruses of "Oh, tree! Where's my ass?" - and brilliantly, it's from Mercy of Kalr's point of view and evokes how aptly named the ship is: the story is all quiet warmth and kindness, and just, I loved this a lot. Possibly my favourite of all of them so far.

Bzzt (4148 words) by Anonymous
Playthings (Gun Safety PSA)
The canon for this one is a 30-second gun safety PSA. In the true spirit of Yuletide, I am now deeply invested in the internal lives of these people.

The Mystery of the Egyptian Curse (3722 words) by Anonymous
Lynes and Mathey Series - Amy Griswold & Melissa Scott
I am a tiny little bit dubious about the premise of this one - I think given the historical setting, the characters wouldn't take the risk they take, in this story - but given that it is unutterably and ridiculously delightful. Miss Frost is the best detective, the best ally and basically the best everything, just as she ought to be. (Also! "For every David and Jonathan, there was a Naomi and Ruth" - eeeee.)

The Sand In The Bottom Half Of The Hourglass. (2015 words) by Anonymous
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell - Susanna Clarke
Arabella Strange and Emma Pole are visited by the Raven King. This one made me tear up and I'm not entirely sure why.

The Cartographer Tries to Map a Course (2018 words) by Anonymous
Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch
In which Abigail Kamara is grown up, and goes to visit the genius loci of Ettersberg, who has returned - and doesn't take Nightingale, who is too afraid - and too young - to go back. This gives me chills, all the way down into the ground and all the bits of me that love places in fiction. If the one above isn't my favourite of the whole collection, then this one is.

I've read lots more! So probably there's more to come. I also really, really, really liked Cabin Pressure - Shim and I listened to "Zurich" very happily on Christmas Eve while allegedly cleaning up the kitchen, and had to stop cleaning up the kitchen in order to bask in the utter perfection of it. Oh, my show! It was so warm and funny and careful of its characters, and the cast were clearly having a ball, and just - after all these years, it was such a beautiful ending and I love it so much and still.

I've also been enjoying the Radio 4 Good Omens, but don't actually have much to say about it; the characters have lived in my head for so many years that it seems nice, but unremarkable, that they're on the radio.

I never do have enough hours in the day. I'm very, very lazy - when I work it's in very intense bursts, so as to get it over - but I've reached that point of the year where the intense bursts are lasting days rather than hours. I am still ill, but haven't stopped moving yet - today I got up, went back to bed, got up again, gritted my teeth, went to work at lunchtime and hit my targets, but through kind of a haze (the other trainee, who has known me for two weeks, said, "You are really ridiculous", in a loving manner that reminded me deeply of gavagai and hathy_col and makes me think she may be getting to know me rather well) - and I was going to drive to Leeds tomorrow, but was thinking better of it, what with a) general haze in head and b) so much work to do this weekend on various things. I am making the first steps towards my post-training-contract life, as well as taking evening classes at Hills Road. (I went to the first one on Tuesday and it was a delight: the teacher is wonderful, the class engaged and enthusiastic, and I think I might make friends who aren't lawyers! And also, isn't it amazing to be in a classroom? To put your hand up? To make notes? To not have to be responsible for anything other than your notes? I think I would recommend adult education to everyone, it's such a joy.)

So, yes, there are good and worthy reasons for me to have lots of homework this weekend, but the fact remains I do. But, genius idea: take the train! So I am taking the nice smooth East Coast main line up to Leeds tomorrow, and I won't have to drive, and I'll get some work done, and I get to see tau_sigma and hathy_col.

What else, what else? I am still writing trope ficlets, in around sleeping, working and working - it's a treat.

And courtesy of elb, I am listening to a lot of songs by Niraj Chag, of which my favourite by far is "Ur Jaa". It's a lovely, haunting, wistful love song, and I've listened to it a couple of dozen times today thinking all the time, this reminds me of something. Not even that - not even a reminding of something so much as, somewhere in my mind there is something aligning like a tectonic plate.

I just figured it out. A while ago I recced a beautiful Vorkosigan fic called "L'oiseau qui vole", which is a delicate love story with a central theme evoked by a single line from a (fictional, I believe) old French ballad: "l'oiseau qui vole n'a pas de maître", and it wasn't until I remembered that, that I understood it. Ur jaa, tu jaa paharon ke pichhe - yes. Yes, yes. Such a deeply lovely piece.

As for why the resonance - partly just the dovetailing of themes. But I was thinking about this the other day, about languages and what they feel like, to write in. I don't write in any language other than English, but I have enough grasp of the others to know, dimly, what it might be like to write in them, what it might feel like. When I was writing the trope ficlets, the first one I wrote was called "something in the autumn that is native to your blood" - it was a little thing that I wrote while terribly, terribly sleep-deprived, for philomytha who wanted something about Aral Vorkosigan, Simon Illyan and telepathy. I wrote it and then spent ages trying to find a title for it - the title it does have comes from a Canadian poem that thingswithwings introduced me to originally, and it's a perfectly good title - but, initially, I wanted to call it "tu jaa". I couldn't think of a reason to title it in Hindi, in the end: neither thematic, nor, well, Barrayar Has No Brown People, as we all know.

But... I wanted to call it "tu jaa". Not "tum jao", nor "aap jaiye". It means, "you go", an imperative. But so do all those three. Only "tu jaa" is something you can say to someone you love, to someone you despise, to someone you'd protect and adore and own utterly. You can say that, and I just wrote 17,000 words trying to explain that sort of relationship in a language that stands back from that sort of feeling. One day, maybe, when I'm old, I'll be able to write in languages other than English, and it will feel different. And perhaps - if I feel that resonance, deep below- Hindi and French have a texture like each other. I hope so.

So much nonsense. Right. Productivity. Why do I always pick such convenient times to be ill.

Hello, all. I am here to make a request. I am suffering somewhat at the moment from an attack of Life, and I'm numbing my mind by watching vids. I'm here to ask y'all for recs of whatever vids you're watching at the moment, with one caveat: I have no brainpower left. Not a single bit left. So if it's a vid with a deeply thoughtful constructed reality, or one that explores complex social and political issues - maybe not, mmm? I can handle vids that express "yaaay, I heart [character/show/that thing those characters do in that show]", and I can handle vids that are "yay, ladies!" or 'yay, geeks!" But more than that - anything that involves propositional content - and I have to hide. So sorry, I don't mean to.

To be helpful, here are some I do like and am watching a lot lately, with my current interpretations in square brackets:

-Ground Beneath Her Feet, Sapphire & Steel. [My favourite vid of all time. Atmosphere! Pretty people! Show lovely seventies weird-as-fuck show!]

-Rolling In the Deep, X-Men First Class. [Charles/Erik! <33333!]

-The Test, Star Trek. [Kirk and Spock's love is TWU FOREVER TWU kthxbai.]

-Past In Present, Chak De! India. [Brown girls! India! THERE IS SOMETHING IN MY EYE.]

-Space Girl, multifandom. [oh my heart, my heart]

...etc. Thank you all for your patience during these Troubled Times.

If you wanted to be charitable, you could say I spent this week doing grown-up, house-hunting assessing-relationship things - or you could just say I spent this week lying on Shim's bed watching Sapphire & Steel. (And occasionally taking a deep breath and closing the laptop and not watching it, especially just before bed.)

I am at a loss to explain why I have suddenly fallen in love with a faintly clunky British sci-fi show from the seventies. Because, okay, I have watched lots of classic Doctor Who and lots of Star Trek TOS. And I love them both - I do love them. I love them because you watch TOS and think, huh, this is pretty derivative. And then you think: no, actually, everything else is derived from this. I mean. I love "Amok Time" and "Mirror, Mirror" and "The City at the Edge of Forever". And I love old Who - I love, love, love that here is this show that people, not just sci-fi fans sort of people, watch, and it's full of warmth and sweetness and oh yeah it's been going since 1963. In both of them, I love the scale of imagination - the way they set out to draw on these huge canvasses, these layered and multi-layered plots (Caves of Androzani, anyone? Does everyone else understand it, or am I not the only one?) and quite often they don't have the budget or technical ability to match, but they have the vision.

But... I'm a child of the nineties. Very sad and unfortunately true. Somehow my suspension of disbelief never quite works out when faced with matte-painting alien worlds and monsters made of bubble-wrap. And I think it's perfectly okay, actually, to love shows not just because they are of great cultural import but also because they are camp and fabulously endearing and sometimes the sets fall over. Red Dwarf would have been no fun at all if they'd not, you know, filmed on Crosby beach in the winter time and invited you to believe it was a tropical paradise.

But Sapphire & Steel is different. It didn't have the money or the technology for alien worlds or monsters, so it didn't have them. Instead it has.... well. It has whole serials against the background of one set, with three or four-member casts, with nearly no specical effects. It's entirely PG-rated. And somehow, through the writing and the acting, it's compelling and it's also seriously fucking scary. I mean. Okay, so in one episode there's some sort of evil presence moving things around. A coat drops off a peg, cushions fall off sofas. One of the characters gives voice what the audience is thinking and says, big deal, what harm can that even do?

Behind him, almost unnoticed, a pillow falls into the baby's crib.

That's it, that's what it does. It has a kind of deathless creepiness that I really, really like. And, okay, one of my issues with really getting into old Who is the veeeeeeery slow pacing. I know it was a serial, it's how it was done, but I just... I flag. And this is the same format, and someone on tvtropes describes Sapphire & Steel as having the pacing of "Star Trek The Motion Picture on thorazine", which is probably true - but it works. It really does work. It builds up the tension and foreboding that way until by the last episode you're properly jumpy.

And couple that with the fact it makes a religion of never telling you what the fuck is going on - who are Sapphire and Steel? Well, they wander the universe fixing stuff that's gone wrong. They are not futuristic detectives, as Amazon apparently thinks they are. They are not Time Lords. They are "medium atomic weights" - but no one ever seems to point out that neither sapphire nor steel is an element. They're telepathic between themselves, but not generally. They don't sleep and they don't age. They're very aware of and tied to time. And, while I'm at it, they're played by David McCallum and Joanna Lumley and it's 1979 and I am so grateful for my own bisexuality sometimes I can't even tell you. I mean. Come on. Just. How is this quantity of preternatural beauty even possible.

And they're not human. I really love how well that's done, too: through a mixture of good writing and acting, you're really made to believe that while they look human, they're not. They're alien and amoral and kind of sinister and the relationship between them definitely consists in something but not something you can understand. It's loving and alien and sexually charged and kinky as all-get-out in a lot of ways - okay, obscure, but even so I was amazed to discover that no has ever written it for kink_bingo.

And, there is a fair bit of fic on the AO3 but no actual Sapphire/Steel, which baffles me. The funny thing is, I wanted to find a fic that gets at this whole kinky-sexually-charged-but-inhuman dynamic - and I didn't find it, but I did find a vid, of all things: Ground Beneath Your Feet (on youtube - couldn't find it anywhere else) and I totally love it and have watched a redacted number of times in the last couple of days. (And me, you know me, I'm vid-illiterate, there's a tiny handful of vids that have had enough of an effect on me for me to watch them more than once.) But it's amazing - gets at all that, the relationship between them, the way-creepy-cool vibe the show has, and gives it some actual pace and as a bonus it's very pretty to look at.

And yes. It's Britain in 1979. Sometimes the haircuts remind you of this fact. Sometimes the interior decor does. But, it impresses me by having a non-white character - Lead, who neatly subverts the stereotypes - and by doing interesting things with gender power dynamics. On first gloss, Steel is the dominant half of the pair... but it's not actually quite that simple. I like it.

On the whole this isn't an unreserved rec - if you're not me, for example, and thus maybe don't have a thing for deserted underground stations and urban ghost stories and understated creepiness and all of those things together, it might not be to your taste, and I should mention again that it can be really very disturbing - but. But, I like it better than old Who. Shush. Don't tell anyone.

The DVDs can be had for not that much, so I was going to get them, but on second thoughts, I think I will wait till the house-move is over and then get them delivered to a new address. It is a little ridiculous how exciitng I find this. Hi I am grown up honest.

This is a little early, but what the hell, I'm buzzed and mellow and I want to talk. Today is January 9th, 2011 - another day, nothing special, perhaps. Ten years ago, I was thirteen, nearly fourteen, bright and lost and looking for something; ten years ago, less six weeks, I discovered a fanfiction archive, a television show and a friend.

Ten years ago I met hathycol; today I am twenty-three, nearly twenty-four, and next year I'll be bridesmaid at her wedding. Here's to you, fandom: here's to everything I found, everyone I met, everyone I've loved; everything I've watched and read and seen; every alien city I've slept in among friends. Here's to you, and thanks for everything.

A quiet day, today. Colleen and I went to Manchester with tau_sigma; we went to Afflecks, and sighed for our rapidly-receding days as teenage goths; we went to Forbidden Planet, and bought doughnuts and drank coffee and talked about everything and nothing. I bought a coat. Tali and I made fun of Colleen's passion for Cardassians; we made hen party plans and cackled with laughter. Colleen and I got through a bottle of mellow wine over dinner, and I am happy, so very happy. Perhaps I don't say this as much as I should, but here it is, anyway: fandom is no longer as important to me as it once was. It's no longer my only passion, the only thing I really care about. But that's because when it was, when it shaped my ideas about community and storytelling and what gives people value, it drew out my talents, and it gave me the strength of that community. I care about other things now - like social justice, law, my career and relationships - because I am what fandom made me, because it made me grow up feeling like I could contribute to what I care about. That I can shine as bright as I see everyone else shine.

And I still care about stories. I always will.

fandom_stocking went live today. I had lots of very sweet greetings, but some people have been especially kind: thistlerose wrote me a sweet ficlet, Unpathed Waters, Undreamed Shores, about McCoy and Spock, whom I adore, and if that weren't enough, she also made some very pretty icons. And icepixie made me a vidlet, Sea-Changed, which is Slings & Arrows, Geoffrey and performance and evolution and applause, and it made me cry while simultaneously being very happy. Oh, it's lovely.

It has been a beautiful ten years; the next ten will be different in their own way, but I am so happy to have grown up here.

Oh, hey, scrubbing the bathroom for three hours is not guaranteed to leave you in a sunny mood, who knew. At least I have done it, and may get maybe a teeny weeny bit of my deposit back. Tomorrow, my bedroom, and the day after, the kitchen. Hello, domesticity. But my exams are over! Thank you, kind people who commented, it was good of you. I am feeling... well, not good, exactly, but a lot less stressed. When Cornell and my letting agent(s) and tutors send me emails about Things That Need Done, I do them rather than sitting in the corner to cry. It's refreshing.

(It scares me a little, though, that I will be in the US by the time my results come out. C'est la vie.)

One of the things Cornell want me to do is to write a 250-word biographical description of myself for a little booklet they're going to distribute to the faculty, containing inter alia, "my educational background, work experience, academic areas of interest, family, hobbies, career goals, etc." The memo promises that "sample biographies are enclosed", but they're... not. Anyone ever done one of these? How do you begin? Do you just put, "My name is Iona [last name], and I read PPE at Oxford, and I like science fiction and travel"? (Gosh, how tedious.) Do you even do it in the first person? I'm not even sure.

Also, I know I have academic areas of interest, but am I the only person who feels oddly illegitimate about this sort of thing? I mean, who am I to have academic areas of interest? I have one joint-honours degree and two very-rapid diplomas, it's only five years since I left school. I feel like I'm going to be in a cohort with Real People, whereas I am... not. I'm just me, for heaven's sake. I just write stories. Don't take me too seriously, I want to put, because I certainly don't.

Anyway! Speaking of stories, I am still writing ficlets - I believe we're on four down, eight to go, because two of you helpfully requested the same story - but I'm taking a break this weekend, if no one minds, for a story of my own. tau_sigma was visiting today and yesterday, and we had a lovely time. We went wandering around the Botanical Garden - which I have somehow failed to visit in five years of living in Oxford - and spent the evening drinking pink wine and watching Doctor Who, and making happy noises.

( about Doctor Who, series 5 [spoilers] )

Have two fic recs:

Vita Longa, by sam_storyteller.
Rufus Atius Ferox remembers two childhoods. This is great: long, sensitive and fabulous, and rich in the way it fills in Rory's life alongside the life of the Roman legatus.

Wondrous Strange by lixia84
Eleven/Rory, NC-17. I very rarely just delve for fic these days; I tend to stick to authors I know and reclists. But for some reason I clicked, and this was just a gem. The Doctor and Rory are out getting into trouble, and somehow they're being chased by aliens at the premiere of Puccini's Tosca, and then for some other reason there's a bathhouse, and then. Well, and then. I was impressed with the dialogue - the Doctor in particular really sounds like the Doctor - and the way the author has these two together but doesn't erase Amy at all.

What else, what else? For my leaving Oxford/the UK party, jacinthsong and I are dressing up as Kira and Dax. I have at least spent an entertaining half-hour looking at purple dresses on eBay, which has improved my mood greatly.

(Although, I've been writing this wondering why my hands feel strange - and then remembering why I remember the weird feeling. I have clear memories of Chemistry A-level and spilling NaOH on my hands, trying womanfully not to swear, while my marvellous chemistry teachers explained, meticulously, the lipid reaction going on under my skin and how it was turning my hands into soap.

Guess I know what the active ingredient in the bathroom cleaner was. Ewww.)

Back to writing, I think.

I spent Easter weekend meeting a great deal of shimgray's relatives, and it was rather tiring, but on the whole, not bad; if anyone forgot my name their minds wandered charmingly through the Western Isles. For reference: I have no objection to being called Islay or Skye, but draw the line at Rum, Muck and Eigg.

I am back in Liverpool for the time being, and today my to-do list says "sort life out". (Srsly. One day I shall consider myself a grown-up - it'll be the day I stop making to-do lists that say that.)

Here are the songs of the moment:

Laura Marling - Alpha Shallows
and the grey in the city is too much to bear

Laura Marling - Goodbye England (Covered In Snow)
winter will leave us / goodbye, old England, until next time there's snow

Laura Marling - Hope In The Air
there's hope in the air / there's hope in the water

The Corries - the Mingulay Boat Song
(Look, I spent a lot of time this month being seasick between remote islands.)

Death Cab For Cutie - Meet Me On The Equinox
(I tried SO HARD not to love this song, and I still do. In my defence I succeeded in not downloading the New Moon soundtrack. People who are Death Cab fans, tell me which of their other songs I should be listening to.)

And here are some Amy-Pond-is-awesome fic recs:

and swallow fireflies, by paperclipbitch.
Amy, Rory, and the Doctor, in seventeen parts. This is very, very nice, and full of good lines and nice characterisation, and a lovely ending. I am actually ridiculously impressed by it, to be honest. [hat-tip to forthwritten for this one]

every story has a start by such_heights.
Amy, the Doctor, and Sarah Jane. Lovely.

(My own effort was last night: let it always be known that I was who I am, which is short and maybe gen and maybe not.)

(Actually, can I go off on a tangent for a moment? More and more, I'm starting to dislike how fic is always classified as gen, het, slash, or het&slash if you're lucky. I am a fairly versatile writer - not as much as some - in that I've written love stories and dramatic angstfests and slice-of-life snippets and silly comedies and overdone farces and wistful ponderings and plot-heavy adventure flicks. I like writing, I like trying new things, it's inevitable.

But I can count on the fingers of one hand the times I've sat down and thought, yes, I am writing a story about a relationship. This is one. This is another. I have no problem as classifying the first one as a het & slash story, and the second as slash. But, I don't know, what about all the times I wrote a fic about Sirius being afraid of growing up, and one about Martha trying to understand the Doctor, and Geoffrey finding his peace, and because it makes sense for all those characters' relationships to be part of their lives, they're dealt with as part of the fabric of it all in the stories - but that's not what the story was about, and characterising them as het or slash just distorts them, rather than having any meaning.

It makes me wonder, also, how many great stories I scroll by because I read "het" or "slash" and think, eh, don't feel like a relationship story, and miss the point without clicking.

Okay, I'm done.)

Now I'm doing some work and not looking at pictures of Karen Gillan on the internet.

I had a surprisingly eventful day, considering I didn't talk to anyone and didn't get up until two. (Hi, brain, not useful, thanks.) Here are my purimgifts recs:

First of all, these three stories were for me:

Caifornia Girls, Code, Midnight Radio, gen, Star Trek (2009).
These are about Gaila and Uhura, apart and together, and I really, really like them; they're very simple snippets, but the writing is so elegant, and the execution so neat. Also, Gaila and Uhura = win.

And from the others:

A Certain Slant of Snow, gen, Sports Night/The West Wing.
Amy Gardner meets Dana in an airport bar. This is so great; so smart, so much like them, and I really enjoyed it. It's the first of three, and while I did like the other two, I haven't seen enough Sports Night for them to make entire sense to me, so the rec's limited to the first. But it's great: sharp and fun.

I'm Blushing on the Inside, gen, The West Wing.
Ainsley likes hamantaschen. Also pwning people. Lovely.

End of the Rainbow, Gaila/Kirk, Star Trek (2009)
Gaila has some questions to ask Kirk. I really, really like this for the depth it gives to Gaila, and to Kirk as well for that matter, but to Gaila: it thinks through her motivations with such clear-eyed writing. I like it a lot.

Moving To The Country, gen, Star Trek (2009).
Sulu shows Chekov around San Francisco. Really understated, really nice.

The Final Message, gen, Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
When the people of the Milky Way Galaxy first heard that God's Final Message to His Creation was being displayed, the Jews of the Galaxy were among the first to seek it out. This is... highly strange, and strangely nice.

Untitled (day 1, day 2, day 3), gen, Vorkosigan.
Helen Natalia, the daughter of Count Vorkosigan, has worked something out: she is the best-placed person to take on the countship. Cordelia and Gregor help, in their own ways. It's a lovely story, this, just right in style and tone.

(Also, I was reading this and thinking, huh, it's a complete three-part story, I wonder why the author didn't give it a title?

...then I thought, this is a story about a woman trying to take on a countship, which she doesn't have at the moment. Aha.)

1 Kings 12:3-15, Exodus 7:8-13, Esther 6:1-5, gen, Good Omens, Hebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible, with the amendment of a certain angel and a certain demon, and a certain amount of judicious snarking. The style of these is ludicrously, effortlessly seamless; the biblical language is resonating along, ringing from the rafters the way it always does, and then suddenly the dark scribe didst grin widely, saying unto him, Trust me, this shalt be one for the books. If they weren't a gift for daegaer I would have thought that she wrote them; as it is, they are a delightful mystery.

That is all. My heart hurts, I hate advocacy, why do people need defending in court anyway.

Haven't seen Doctor Who; have seen Sherlock Holmes. Please do not spoil me for the former; I thought the latter was silly and anachronistic and made of pure win.

And here are my yuletide recs. by fandom, mostly: ( Discworld, Slings & Arrows, Babysitters' Club, Anastasia Krupnik, Vorkosigan, Temeraire, Four Weddings and a Funeral, Ballet Shoes, Lord John Grey, Connie Willis' time-travellers, The Culture, the Cambridge Latin Course, and Dar Williams )

That's all. I return to my exciting day of doing nothing at all.